In the sam spirit as Nutrax's, someone I am working with, who is not a native English speaker, told us all the other day that he would be out of pocket on certain days when he meant out of town or out of contact.

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I'm the kid who has this habit of dreamingSometimes gets me in trouble tooBut the truth is I could no more stop dreamingThan I could make them all come true.

In the sam spirit as Nutrax's, someone I am working with, who is not a native English speaker, told us all the other day that he would be out of pocket on certain days when he meant out of town or out of contact.

I've used out of pocket many times...not only am I not at work, I won't be reachable; for example, if I'm going camping and won't have cell service.

In the sam spirit as Nutrax's, someone I am working with, who is not a native English speaker, told us all the other day that he would be out of pocket on certain days when he meant out of town or out of contact.

"Out of pocket" does mean out of contact (in addition to meaning expenses paid for out of one's own resources).

"I feel sarcasm is the lowest form of wit." "It is so low, in fact, that Miss Manners feels sure you would not want to resort to it yourself, even in your own defense. We do not believe in retaliatory rudeness." Judith Martin

I was describing Douglas MacArthur to my freshmen students and mentioned that he had a huge ego. From the reaction I got from the students they didn't know what "ego" meant but were erroneously speculating and were shocked that I'd disclose that to them.

My boss is Israeli and 99% of my coworkers are from Central/South America. My boss speaks Hebrew and Russian fluently, but struggles with English.

I have to be careful how I use idioms, because they will usually stare blankly at me or take what I say literally. It is sometimes pretty funny.

Meanwhile, all 2 of us who are born in the US and speak English fluently can speak entirely in idioms and no one has any idea what we're talking about. (FTR, this is rare and we're not doing it to exclude anyone; it is quite accidental)

When I was little and my mom would give me a bath she'd always say "Skin a rabbit!" when I'd take a bath. Everyone in my family does it. The first time my husband ever heard me tell our daughter to "skin her rabbit" he about flipped out and told me to stop saying it.

In my family, "skin the cat" is how we tell the little ones to strip down for bath time. Or if we're helping them, usually we say it while we pull the shirt off over their head.

I was describing Douglas MacArthur to my freshmen students and mentioned that he had a huge ego. From the reaction I got from the students they didn't know what "ego" meant but were erroneously speculating and were shocked that I'd disclose that to them.

Was english their first language? Ego is such a basic word.

ENglish is their lahgugae but urban dialect, if you will. There is a lot of vocabulary that seems basic until you notice the balnk expression - kids don't always ask. It is actually one ot the frustrations of standardized testing. The test question is phrased in a way that is unfamiliar to the kisd and if it were phrased differently they would know the answer.